BUTTE — Tests have found elevated levels of arsenic and lead in the children’s sandbox at a Montana town’s city park.
The tests conducted at the Benny Goodman Park in Anaconda found that the contamination was well above levels the Environmental Protection Agency considers safe.
Anaconda-Deer Lodge County released the test sampling to The Montana Standard on Wednesday.
Only four of the 55 test pits in the park were clean.
The area where the arsenic level was the highest in the park was the sandbox.
EPA is planning to remediate about 1,000 properties in Anaconda for excessive toxic metals in the soil thought to be caused by a copper smelter.
Atlantic Richfield Co., which shut down the smelter in 1980, has offered to replace the contaminated sand with new sand.